Before I do, I need to know that the font size issue has been resolved in RM7, particularly if using MacBridge on a current model iMac.

I will be upgrading to an iMac soon and would like to port my Legacy files (on a Windows machine) into RootsMagic onto the iMac.

I had to stop using RM6 because the font sizes aren't scalable in all dialog boxes. I tried increasing the system font display size, but it wasn't a good workaround for a couple of reasons. First, it made the display in every other program I use wonky. Second, it only affected part of the fonts in RM, the rest remained unreadable (for my tired eyes).

It would also be great to get some feedback from others using RM7 and MacBridge on Mac products. From reading early posts after the release, it looks like there were quite a few issues. Have those been resolved?

Before I do, I need to know that the font size issue has been resolved in RM7, particularly if using MacBridge on a current model iMac.

I will be upgrading to an iMac soon and would like to port my Legacy files (on a Windows machine) into RootsMagic onto the iMac.

I had to stop using RM6 because the font sizes aren't scalable in all dialog boxes. I tried increasing the system font display size, but it wasn't a good workaround for a couple of reasons. First, it made the display in every other program I use wonky. Second, it only affected part of the fonts in RM, the rest remained unreadable (for my tired eyes).

It would also be great to get some feedback from others using RM7 and MacBridge on Mac products. From reading early posts after the release, it looks like there were quite a few issues. Have those been resolved?

There is one problem that a number of us have found when using MacBridge where the solution seems to be very elusive - see the discussion on "Invalid floating point operation".

However, I think you will find that the character display size issue will still be a major problem - that is my personal opinion, so others may take a different view. If you look back through the MacBridge forum you will see a number of references to this topic, though sometimes they are hidden under different subjects.

I was already running RM6 under CrossOver, and that exposes the ability to alter the DPI setting for the RM virtual machine, and this is independent of any other program you use on the Mac. I've used DPI settings of between 140 and 160, and that allows one to use 14 point fonts where one can select the fonts in RM, and that results in the fonts where one has no control in RM being adequate though perhaps a little on the small side of the ideal. I suppose pushing the DPI setting even higher and using small fonts in RM would fully balance all the font sizes used throughout RM and the window controls.

I have raised the character size issue as an RM problem without any success and lobbied quite hard over the issue here on the forums, as it should be possible to ship MacBridge with different DPI settings, but all to no avail. I would suggest that you contemplate using CrossOver, despite the cost, unless something changes with MacBridge.

For info, I've recently moved from a 2008 iMac to a new Retina iMac, and having set the display settings on the new iMac to increase everything by 25 percent, I find all the Mac usage to be fine to my ageing eyes as well as RM with settings as above.

J.P., I have a question for you about your Retina 5K iMac and the font display.

I'm currently using a 15" laptop, with high native resolution. I've decreased the resolution to help increase my font size, but many of the windows are still too small.

I'm wondering how increasing my screen size (when I get my iMac) will impact the font sizes. Have you previously used a smaller screen? How did switching to your 27" screen impact the font sizes?

Thank you!

My old iMac was set at 1680 x 1050 pixels and the new Retina iMac uses scaling to map to the native 5120 x 2880 pixels, though this is on a 27 inch panel rather than a 20 inch, so even with the same pixel counts, things would appear bigger. The default scaling is 2560 x 1440 (so each "virtual pixel" is mapped to 4 real pixels), and it is to this virtual screen to which applications write. For applications, one can generally adjust the font but certain of the windowing fonts, such as the menu bar, were verging on being too small (even though these small fonts are dramatically clearer because of the enhanced real pixel count). That is why I have switched the scaled size to 2048 x 1152, which results in everything appearing 25 percent bigger than with the default setting.

Now, in RootsMagic under CrossOver, I have increased the DPI within the "Windows" virtual machine from, I think, 136 on the old iMac to about 150 on the new iMac, but the fonts defined in RM have been reduced from a mix of 18 and 16 point to mainly 14 point. The result of all this is that the fields where one can't change the font size in RM appear relatively larger relative to the fonts one can change, which is what everyone would probably want. And I could probably adjust things further - increase the DPI setting and reduce the RM defined font sizes. I'll perhaps try that tomorrow. Note that these adjustments only affect the RM windows - all the normal Mac stuff is affected by the scaling selected (as is RM, in addition to the RM specific adjustments).

To those unfamiliar with the Mac, this all may sound somewhat complicated, but it is really very easy to do. Within System Preferences, go to Display, and change the setting from "Best for Display" to "Scaled" and select one of the 5 choices - the middle one is the same as "Best", I chose the one to the left of it. Within CrossOver, open the "control panel" for the RM bottle (virtual machine) and on the Display tab, change the DPI setting. Then within the RM Program Option Fonts tab, choose whatever fonts work best for you.

Now, in RootsMagic under CrossOver, I have increased the DPI within the "Windows" virtual machine from, I think, 136 on the old iMac to about 150 on the new iMac, but the fonts defined in RM have been reduced from a mix of 18 and 16 point to mainly 14 point. The result of all this is that the fields where one can't change the font size in RM appear relatively larger relative to the fonts one can change, which is what everyone would probably want. And I could probably adjust things further - increase the DPI setting and reduce the RM defined font sizes. I'll perhaps try that tomorrow. Note that these adjustments only affect the RM windows - all the normal Mac stuff is affected by the scaling selected (as is RM, in addition to the RM specific adjustments).

As hinted at, I've just experimented with increasing the DPI further. Contradicting what I wrote above, I have been running with a DPI setting of 140, with all the selectable fonts that can be adjusted in RM to 10 point. In my opinion, it is quite usable wit those settings but I have now set the dpi to 200 and all the selectable fonts to 9 point. At that size, all fonts in RM over which one has no control are approximately the same size as all the selectable fonts. This has achieved my objective of eliminating the issue of the small unchangeable fonts being too small.

The only things that remain in a smallish font are the menubar command names and their pulldown options - this applies to RM6 but in RM7 they are significantly larger for some reason, so this is not an issue for new users.

So far the only negative effects that I have observed are that the graphics in the backup prompt window and the icons in the program options panels are a little too large for the space available. However understanding and using these is very clear.